Stellenbosch-based business incubator LaunchLab has launched the 2018 edition of The Ideas Programme.
LaunchLab announced the latest edition in a tweet today. The initiative — the incubator’s longest running support programme and now in its seventh year — aims to assist early-stage startups looking to validate their concepts or improve their technology offering to the market.
LaunchLab achieves this by providing participating startups with access to its client network of corporates, who in turn, assist with idea validation.
The programme is aimed at startups that either do not have a prototype or, for that have not yet seen significant sales.

Google earlier today announced 12 startups that will participate in the first Google Launchpad Accelerator Africa class at an event in Lagos, Nigeria.
The Launchpad Accelerator Africa programme is aimed at early-stage African startups and will operate out of Lagos, Nigeria.
In a statement, Google Nigeria country director Juliet Ehimuan said when the initial Launchpad Accelerator Africa announcement was made last year, the company also extended its Digital Skills for Africa initiative to train 10 million Africans over five years.

The 12 startups in Google’s first Launchpad Accelerator Africa class are from Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda and South Africa

Looking to get into the South African startup scene or brush up on some of your skills? Well, you’ve come to the right place.
This article is part of a weekly series that highlights all the top startup competitions, networking sessions, workshops and conferences around South Africa, and the greater region. If you have any event recommendations for us to add to the list, or next week’s, please let us know in the comments below or send us an email.
Not all of the events are free and some will require booking in advance. Please click on the event names to find out more [...]

Keen on winning a share of US$1-million as well as mentorship that will help you launch or grow your business in Africa? Then you’ll want to apply for the 2018 African Entrepreneurship Awards.
In addition to a share of US$1-million in prize money, winners of the award will receive free online mentoring from over 400 entrepreneurs, investors and other business owners.
Applications for the awards opened two weeks ago (1 March) and will close on 30 April.
The awards are generally open to African citizens over 18 who either have ideas for or are running innovative for-profit businesses with a positive social impact.

A recent report by Visa shows net benefits businesses, consumers and authorities would gain if they transitioned from cash-based economies to full digital payments.
The Cashless Cities: Realising the benefits of digital payments report — which was compiled by economics and research firm Roubini ThoughtLab — is based off data drawn from 3000 consumers and 900 businesses across six cities, which was then extrapolated to 94 cities around the world.
Read more: Move to full digital payments could net Joburg over $3bn in benefits a year
In all, the study covers 100 cities from 80 countries around the world. An infographic at the bottom of the article [...]

“Fantastic” — that is how Gron Digital CEO Tebogo Makamo describes the performance of his startup’s pre-initial coin offering (pre-ICO), in which the company was able to raise $1.2-million from 1768 contributors. The first round of the ICO kicked off yesterday (15 March).
Gron Digital, through its blockchain platform, aims to become an industry standard in making the gambling sector more transparent. The startup launched its pre-ICO in January and was able to reach its soft cap of 1200 Ethereum coins.
The startup plans to run four ICO rounds, with the first to run from 15 to 29 March. The second round will kick off on 29 March.

Applications are now open for the 2018 Global Cleantech Innovation Programme for SMMEs in South Africa (GCIP-SA).
The programme is part of a global initiative that aims to address environmental and economic challenges as well as issues around energy through the promotion of clean technology innovation.
This year’s competition will focus on energy efficiency, renewable energy, waste beneficiation (including e-waste), water efficiency, green buildings, green transportation and environmental protection.

Applications for the Global Cleantech Innovation Programme for SMMEs in South Africa close on 2 May

The programme, which for the past four years been run as a donor-funded project, was this year incorporated into the [...]

Internet of Things (IoT) strategy provider SMME IoT has signed an agreement with IoT network provider SqwidNet to connect one million devices within the next three to five years in South Africa.
The partnership will provide SqwidNet with an opportunity to provide its modules and devices to the existing network of partners that SMME IoT services.

SqwidNet CEO Reshaad Sha believes the partnership will help the company expand into other sectors

In a statement today (15 March), SqwidNet CEO Reshaad Sha (pictured above) said the company operates across a range of sectors, including the finance, human resource management and technology fields.
“We are confident that [...]

Getihu, an investment fund for early-stage software and data as a service (Saas, DaaS) startups, officially launched in South Africa last night (14 March) with the opening of an innovation hub in Cape Town.
Getihu was founded last year by serial entrepreneur Ryan Paterson and chief investment officer Thomas Schmider. Schmider co-founded one of Europe’s biggest game developers Infogrames Entertainment in 1983, which went on to acquire US-games developer Atari Inc in 2008.
Paterson (pictured below), who is also Getihu’s chief entrepreneur officer, told Ventureburn that the fund — which started off with the founders investing their own money — invests between $25 000 and [...]

Global real estate platform Wealth Migrate has opted to delay the launch of the company’s first initial coin offering (ICO) by three weeks to ensure that the company abides by all the necessary financial regulations, says the company’s CEO Scott Picken.
Commenting via email to Ventureburn yesterday on why the South African company did not launch the ICO for its WealthE token yesterday (14 March) as expected, Picken (pictured above) said the crowd sale is now planned to kick off on 4 April.
He added that the token’s presale is currently underway through a manual process and that so far $2.5-million has been raised from [...]

With just over two months left in which to raise R5-million in funding, things at Johannesburg fintech i-Pay are picking up, says co-founder and CEO Thomas Pays.
“We haven’t (had) a quiet period in the past two months,” said Pays (pictured above in conversation with Sarah Strauss) at a French Tech event held yesterday at Workshop 17 in Cape Town.
“We can work 18-hours straight, there’s still so many requests and enquiries from clients that it does feel like a good scale-up now,” he said.
Pays describes the overall change in pace in running the business — dealing with client enquiries and holding meetings — akin to [...]

In a bid to foster regional payments innovation and fintech entrepreneurship in Sub-Saharan Africa, global payments company Visa today announced the launch of the Everywhere Initiative on the continent at the DHL Ecommerce Money Africa conference in Cape Town.
Visa’s Everywhere Initiative is an innovation programme designed to encourage the emergence of “the next big thing” in digital payments globally.
The initiative has since its inception in 2015 awarded over $1-million and mentorship to 36 winners selected from over 130 finalists in over 40 countries in North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia.
In all, more than 2100 startups globally have participated in the [...]

The Southern African Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (Savca) has announced the launch of the inaugural Savca Industry Awards.
The annual sector accolades form part of the organisation’s 20th anniversary celebration and will recognise portfolio companies involved the private equity and venture capital sector in the region, Savca said in a press release today.
All investee companies that are headquartered in Southern Africa and are currently benefiting from these types of investments, or that have had investors exit within the last 12 months, are eligible for consideration by the judging panel.
Judges will comprise business leaders and captains of industry, with the awards [...]

The GSM Association (GSMA) has opened applications for Round 3 of the Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund.
GSMA announced the opening of applications for the sector-agnostic fund yesterday (12 March) in a statement on its website. Interested applicants have until 15 April to submit their pitches.

Successful applicants to GSMA’s Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund can get up £250 000 in funding

GSMA’s Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund provides selected startups working with mobile tech in Africa and Asia Pacific with up to £250 000 equity-free funding, technical assistance and the opportunity to partner with mobile operators to scale their products and services into sustainable businesses with socio-economic impact.
The fund’s startup portfolio currently [...]

SA bitcoin exchange Luno is still working with bank authorities in Malaysia to get its bank account there up and running again, after the country’s tax authority last month took the decision to unfreeze its account the company’s bank account.
The tax authority in January froze the startup’s Malaysia bank account with Maybank, after it launched a probe into the cryptocurrency company’s activities in Malaysia.
The account has since been unfrozen, but Maybank has yet to reopen it, so that Luno can begin trading bitcoin again in Malaysia.
Read more: SA startup Luno’s Malaysian bank account still frozen as tax probe continues
Responding to Ventureburn via [...]

Cape Town smart mobility startup GoMetro has delayed the planned launch this month of the trial of its new ride-sharing service flx. The startup’s CEO Justin Coetzee says the startup will instead launch the service next month.
“Basically, the water crisis meant that corporates spent two or three months worrying about their water supply and their staff’s welfare – so we hit a delay on the flx pilot,” Coetzee told Ventureburn in response to an email yesterday.
GoMetro’s flx service aims to to offer employers a chance to get staff to work on time more affordably, by providing them with various shared transport options and by grouping staff members who stay near to [...]

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) — through the Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship — has partnered with the Mastercard Foundation to launch the 2018 edition of the Zambezi Prize for Innovation In Financial Inclusion.
Through the prize MIT and the Mastercard Foundation aim to uncover early-stage African startups that are involved in promoting and championing innovation in financial inclusion on the continent.
Applications for the competition, which opened yesterday, are set to close on 1 June, with finalists to be announced on 18 August.
This year’s competition is organised around nine challenges. These are: low financial literacy, limited access to financial institutions, low and [...]

A 34-year-old businessman and business consultant who counts former president Jacob Zuma as his great uncle, now runs Startup Grind Pretoria.
Startup Grind is a global movement which hosts regular talks with entrepreneurs. Pretoria is one of 13 cities in South Africa that have chapters.
“The question about JZ is one I get just about daily,” says Monde Zuma (pictured above with mLab Southern Africa CEO Derrick Kotze), who adds that he is accustomed to call the former president “grandfather”.
He took over from Guillaume De Smedt in November, when De Smidt (who also ran the Cape Town chapters for some years) moved to [...]